You receive 4 card drops for owning L4D2. A card drop earns you the right to receive a card by playing the game. You can get four cards to drop by playing L4D2. One problem, you can only get 4 this way. To get the complete 8 you need to trade among friends or even strangers. Who knows, you might even meet your new best L4D2 friend ever trading. You two realize you have more than L4D2 in common, get married, settle down, raise a family and then complete your set when your third son earns the Spitter Card and trades it to you.

What happens when you complete all 8? You can craft an L4D2 badge and earn an L4D2 emoticon item, profile background, chance to get a discount coupon, and 100XP for your steam level.

We have seen some discussions about some of the sample Mutations with shipped with the Beta. Some of these like Holdout are fully formed game modes. Others are tests or example code for other people to play around with.

A good example is with the L4D1 Mutation. It is a sample Mutation to show how easy it is to change the game. Don’t like some of the choices? Change them. The code below is the script file for that mode – 52 lines of script. You can see how simple, yet powerful the new scripting mode is. For more information visit the <a href="https://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/L4D2_EMS/Intro">L4D2 EMS Wiki.</a>

Currently, changes to L4D2 will first appear in the Beta before they appear in the main game. The Beta will change often. This mean this build is very active so you might want to avoid it if you have bandwidth caps. Today we released another update for it. You can read the <a href="http://store.steampowered.com/news/10607/">release notes</a> for the update here.

While the tools are only available on Windows, everyone in the Beta can play the new EMS content.

We do not have servers running for the Beta yet as we concentrate on client issues and fixes but the server code has been released and is working - so let us know if you have any issues with Windows or Linux servers. We will be rolling out our own dedicated servers in the near future.

If you currently own Left 4 Dead 2, You should see “Left 4 Dead 2 Beta” in your library. If it doesn’t show up, restart Steam. This is a complete build of Left 4 Dead 2, so the build is as large as the current game.

You also receive access to the Left 4 Dead 2 Beta Authoring tools and Left 4 Dead 2 Beta Dedicated Server. This will allow you to start working with EMS.

The Beta version also contains updated Windows and Mac clients, so even if you are not running under Linux you can help by testing the Beta.

Current changes in this build include:- Server operators can now specify whether or not custom content is allowed when playing on their servers. This can be set on a per game mode basis - see cfg/addonconfig.cfg for details.

- Fixed main menu not refreshing after workshop add-ons have been loaded. Custom UI skins should display correctly now.

If you aren’t up for downloading the beta, we are trying a new experiment with our friends over at Pinion. On the additional official servers they are hosting, we have added four new community campaigns so that you can get the stock L4D2 experience on some great community maps. It was tough work playing so many great custom campaigns as we narrowed it down to four. To quote Daniel from Pinion, "Diescraper has some of the best levels I've played in L4D2!!". Yes it does… And with campaigns only a mouse click away thanks to the Workshop, make sure to give them a try this weekend.

Past that, testing is continuing on both the Left 4 Dead 2 version of Linux and the Beta version of L4D2 which includes our new Extended Mutation System. Both are testing well and the team is embracing 8 hour days of play testing.

Right now that content is set to not play on Valve dedicated servers – but that is about to change. We are working to allow the custom content to be usable in non-competitive modes like Campaign and Survival. For now you can see it by playing on third party servers or local games.

We have a few more things in the works.

We are hard at work on the Linux release. While we don’t have a solid ETA yet, we are internally testing on Linux, MAC, and PC. Right now, it is looking pretty good. We will have more news as we get closer to release.

In Left 4 Dead Beta our new scripted mode – EMS (Extended Mutation System) continues its testing with more mods and features being added. When this is released, we will also be updating some match making features to let you more easily find games and lobbies for your favorite Mutations.

They aren’t coming alone. Joining them from the infected side is the Witch and a special version of the Tank. The Tank even comes in a new form - the Mini Tank. It is all the ferociousness of the giant Tank but in a cute cuddly but deadly package.

That covers L4D2 in RE6, but what kind of self-respecting mash-up only goes one way? Don’t worry, we’ve got that covered. First up, we are adding three RE6 creatures to the Left 4 Dead 2 Workshop - Lepotitsa, Napad and Ogroman as Special Infected replacements.

To create a character and submit it to the Workshop you will need access to the L4D2 Authoring tools. And just in case you have been living hole, covered in cement, at the bottom of a lake to protect yourself from the zombie apocalypse and you just now came out of said hole and still have not purchased L4D2 - we have even put <a href='http://store.steampowered.com/app/550/?snr=1_7_15__13'>L4D2 on sale</a> this week for an incredible 75% off!